


For Luck

by 0hHeyThereBigBadWolf



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Based on a Tumblr Post, Do Not Re-Post To Another Site, Everything is Beautiful and Nothing Hurts, Fluff and Humor, Idiots in Love, Merlin "Nat 1 Deception" Emrys and Arthur "Disaster Bi" Pendragon, Multi, Sir Leon the Long-Suffering, They're All Idiots Okay?, but we love them anyways, the Knights ship it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-07
Updated: 2019-06-07
Packaged: 2020-04-12 04:31:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19124638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/0hHeyThereBigBadWolf/pseuds/0hHeyThereBigBadWolf
Summary: It starts off as a bit of miscommunication, but nobody's complaining. The knights are really just relieved that something's finally being done because the tension was starting to get a little ridiculous.





	For Luck

**Author's Note:**

> This hit me like a freight train after reading [this post](https://my-latest-obsession.tumblr.com/post/185301300399/how-about-a-fic-from-the-knights-pov-called-for) on Tumblr.

If there’s one thing the knights of Camelot all look forward to, it’s the matches where they fight one another in bouts, testing their skills and let off a bit of steam. It isn’t a proper tourney exactly, though they invariably end up with a small crowd of observers, and the only real prize to be had is boasting rights and perhaps a patrol-free day.

“Remember you’re not allowed to actually kill anyone, Gwaine,” Leon reminds as they put on their armour and gather their weapons. “Or maim. Or cripple. Be nice.”

“Nice? How dare you, Leon. I am _always_ nice,” Gwaine retorts, doing a passing imitation of indignation, one hand pressed to his chest.

“Sure you are,” Percival snorts under his breath, and Merlin chortles, sitting on the bench beside the larger man, sharpening Arthur’s sword.

“Pardon me for interrupting your manly rites, good sirs,” Guinevere says laughingly as she crosses the field to join them, “but I have a gift needs giving for my husband.” She pulls a handkerchief from her pocket—pale blue and embroidered with white flowers around the edges—and ties it around Lancelot’s sword arm. A lady’s favour for her champion. Smiling, she gives him a quick kiss. “For luck, sir knight,” she says before heading back to join the other watchers at the edge of the practice field.

_“Awww,_ how _sweet,”_ Gwaine drawls as soon as she’s out of earshot, he and Elyan both making exaggerated cooing sounds, fluttering their lashes and mock-swooning against each other.

Lancelot takes the whetstone from Merlin and chucks it at them. “Jealousy,” he says. “All I hear is jealousy.”

Still laughing, Gwaine turns to Percival, holding up his arms. “Aw, c’mon, Percival? One for luck?” he asks, waggling his eyebrows. Percival rolls his eyes, but the irrepressible knight advances on him with arms still extended. “Bring it here, big man, you know you want to.” He makes a lunge forward, but Percival straight-arms him, one big hand catching him beneath the chin and knocking him over on his arse. “Okay, first of all, rude,” Gwaine says, rubbing a hand beneath his chin, then turns to leer at Arthur. “What about you, sire? Would you like a kiss for luck? You’ll need it, if you’re going up against me.”

Arthur scoffs, lifting his chin and putting on a haughty tone. “I’ll have you know that princes only accept kisses from fair maidens,” he replies, then smirks. “And you are neither.”

“How _dare_ you. I am pure as the winter snows.”

“Pure as mud, more like.”

Gwaine jabs a finger at him. “Just for that, I’m not going to go easy on you.”

Arthur snickers. “I tremble in fear.”

“Clotpoles, all of you,” Merlin stage-mutters, fastening the last buckle of the prince’s armour. “There you are, sire. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to sit with Gwen and watch you and the rest of the idiots beat each other senseless with pieces of metal.” He pushes to his feet and starts away.

“Merlin,” Arthur calls, and the young man stops. “Forgetting something?”

Merlin rolls his eyes so hard it’s a miracle he doesn’t hurt himself. He walks right up to the prince, takes his golden head between his hands, and plants a kiss on Arthur’s forehead. “Happy now, _sire?”_ he asks with a little mocking bow, and without waiting for an answer, he turns and saunters off to join Gwen.

Only years of practice allows Leon to hide his laughter at the look on Arthur’s face. It’s rather like one who’s recently taken a blow to the head in a sparring match. Lancelot keeps a straight face by the grace of God alone, Elyan almost succeeding as well; Gwaine muffles a snort into his fist, and even Percival’s mouth is twitching.

Arthur blinks twice and shakes himself out of it, glancing over at them. “What are you lot looking at? Come on, let’s get on with it,” he barks.

They chorus a reply of ‘yes, sire’ in almost perfect unison, and Leon has to bite his lips together at the flush that’s creeping up the sides of Arthur’s neck as the prince picks up the shield that Merlin had forgotten to hand him.

 

“You know, Merlin, as far as horrible ideas go, I’d say this is one of your best,” Arthur hisses under his breath, peering at the dark shape of the half-crumbled fort, almost completely overgrown by dense shrubbery.

“I’m the fastest runner, Arthur, and you know it,” the younger man whispers back.

Percival agrees with that, though he also appreciates the sentiment of not wanting to send an unarmed manservant to lure out a band of mercenaries. But with those legs of his, Merlin can outstrip any of them in a flat run, especially without any armour or sword to weigh him down, and they can’t try to fight the mercenaries in the fort itself.

“Besides, I’m fairly certain _you’ve_ not gotten any faster, sire, considering your waistline,” Merlin adds flippantly.

“I am _not_ fat!” comes the strident hiss in reply.

This hardly seems the time to be discussing that, though it _is_ amusing to hear Merlin say things that would land anyone else in the dungeons for a month or more.

He hears the prince heave a sigh and glances out from behind his hiding spot just in time to see Arthur plant a kiss against Merlin’s cheek; it’s not so dark that Percival can’t see Merlin’s cheeks darken. “For luck,” Arthur says, then puts a hand to Merlin’s back and gives him a shove forward. “Now go.”

Merlin almost goes sprawling, staggering a few steps, then turns towards the fort and darts his way over.

It must be some kind of luck, anyways, because they take the fort without so much as a scratch. Percival uses a scrap of cloth to wipe the blood off his sword as Gwaine tries to make himself acquainted with the mercenaries’ stash of wine, warded off by Lancelot and Leon. He glances over to see Merlin standing beside Arthur, grinning smugly, and the prince rolling his eyes. However, both of them have high colour in their faces, and they can hardly hold each other’s gaze without flushing.

Percival shakes his head, marvelling at how a pair of decently intelligent men could be so very stupid sometimes.

 

Elyan is going to kill these idiots. This is the third time that his riding gloves have turned up ‘missing’ within a month. He’s near certain that Gwaine is behind it, but he has a creeping suspicion that Leon’s involved too. For such a dignified man, Leon has his occasional bouts of mischief.

After a search of his chambers turns up empty, he heads down to the armoury. A strange place for them to be, sure, but odder things have happened. Especially with those two involved.

“Do you really have to fight him?” Merlin asks, quite solemn.

Arthur chortles. “Oh, do relax, it’s not to the death, just to first blood. It’s a tradition of theirs, apparently,” he replies, referring to the visiting prince from the new sovereignty of Essitir, who took over after Cenred. They’re not quite as martially-inclined as Cenred had been, but not exactly peaceful, either. One of their traditions is to engage in single combat before becoming allies, to test the strength of their compatriots.

Elyan’s looking forward to the duel. The goal isn’t to kill each other, obviously; it ends with the drawing of first blood. He heads towards their voices, intent on asking them if they’d seen his gloves anywhere.

“First blood, like that’s any better. You can get a lot of blood by chopping your thick cabbagehead off,” Merlin grumbles.

“Such staggering faith. Well, how about a kiss for luck, then?”

That stops Elyan just before he rounds the corner, and he risks a peek around.

Arthur’s sitting on a table, kicking his heels boyishly and smiling. Merlin is wiping down the last gleaming pieces of armour, drying his hands on a clean bit of cloth. The tips of his ears are bright pink as he looks up at the prince. Smirking, Arthur nudges the young man with his knee. “C’mon, surely you want me to have good luck.”

Merlin stands up and brushes a kiss against Arthur’s cheek. “There.”

“I know you can do better than that, _Mer_ lin.”

“Oh, you—” He hooks his fingers in Arthur’s collar and tugs him in for another kiss, this time not quite on the cheek.

Elyan shakes his head in exasperation, turning and walking out of the armoury. He’ll just have to go without his gloves today. It’s taken those two long enough as it is, he’s hardly going to interrupt them now.

 

“If you don’t stop picking at it, it’ll come undone and I’ll have to choke you with it, now stop.”

And that is entirely too interesting of a sentence for Gwaine to pass up the opportunity to eavesdrop just a little bit. Well, it’s not exactly eavesdropping, since they’re in the same room anyways, but there’s being in the same room and there’s listening in.

Merlin straightens the high, stiff collar of the ceremonial outfit that Arthur has to wear for all this nonsense about becoming Camelot’s official prince regent or whatever it is, and in all honesty, Gwaine’s glad it’s not him. He knows for a fact that the embroidery on those damned outfits prickles and itches like nobody’s business. Same must be true for this since Arthur keeps picking at the cloth-of-gold threads.

Merlin swats his hand again. “I said stop it.”

“It _itches,”_ Arthur grumbles.

“Don’t be a baby, it’s just for today.”

Princess does a bit more whinging—very noble whinging, naturally—and lets Merlin fuss over him more, straightening his outfit. “There. Perfect. Mess it up again and I’ll have to kill you.”

“Threatening your regent is treason.”

Merlin smirks. “You’re not regent yet, clotpole, don’t get ahead of yourself.”

“But I am still the crown prince, _Mer_ lin, so it’s still treason.”

“Well, if it’s treason both ways, I suppose it doesn’t matter that I’m threatening an ass.”

Arthur rolls his eyes, shaking out his hands and bouncing on the balls of his feet. Gwaine almost laughs. It’s funny, really it is, that a man who’s fought sorcerers and monsters and evil in all shapes and sizes is nervous about some ridiculous ceremony. He supposes they all have their little foibles, but that one’s just hilarious. Camelot’s golden boy has stage fright.

“You know what you’re supposed to say?”

“Yep.” The prince bounces on his toes again and tugs one of Merlin’s jacket ties so it comes uneven from the other. “Kiss for luck?”

Merlin huffs and straightens out the ties. “You’re reciting some drabble in a room full of greybeards. It’s hardly going to go wrong.”

“It could,” Arthur insists. “I could open my mouth and forget how to say a word. I could get sick right on their boots. It’s a big day, I need a bit of extra luck.”

For a moment, Merlin just stares at the prince, one eyebrow arched, arms folded over his chest, but then he leans forward and kisses Arthur, quick and darting, the tips of his ears turning bright pink as he takes a step back. “There. Now get in your places, stop fretting, and stop _picking at the damn stitching_ before I kill you,” Merlin admonishes. “I’ll go let the old buggers in.”

As the young man walks over to open the doors, Gwaine elbows Percival gleefully, and Percival slips a few coins into his palm before they all have to stand at attention, drawing up straight.

 

“Alright, gents, dinner is served,” Lancelot announces as he returns to the camp with a string of fat trout; he’s surprised to see that Elyan has their cooking pan set up over the fire and is picking out a few bits of dried herbs from their supplies. “Where’s Merlin and Arthur?” he wonders; Merlin’s usually the one to do the cooking.

“They’re, ah, gathering firewood,” Elyan replies. Appeased with his choice of garnish, he starts slicing pieces of wild onion into the pan.

He raises his eyebrows at that, taking out his knife and starting on the fish. “Really? And how long have they been off…gathering, exactly?” He’s fairly certain that they’re not gathering anything at all. Well, except perhaps some grass stains. It’s become almost a rite of passage, catching the two of them.

“About an hour,” Leon replies, taking a seat beside him and helping to portion the fish into smaller fillets.

Gwaine snorts. “Then we might as well go ahead and eat. They won’t be back for at least another half-hour,” he declares, already holding his plate even though the fish isn’t even in the pan yet; Percival nods agreement.

By the time Merlin and Arthur come back to the camp, it’s been closer to three-quarters of an hour, and neither of them is burdened with any kind of firewood, either, accepting their plates from Elyan. Gwaine is flicking fish bones at Percival, and the quiet knight looks as though he’s debating whether or not pitching Gwaine into the stream would be worth the complaining later. Leon seems to be debating whether or not it’d be worth stopping Percival if he decided for the stream-dunking.

Nobody deigns to point out that there’s a leaf caught in the back of Arthur’s hair, or the fact that Merlin’s vest is on inside-out.

It’s for luck, obviously.


End file.
